Agents of SHIELD
by PhoenixAngel47
Summary: Paige is back as Whiplash and a Level Six agent of SHIELD. After a brief confrontation with Director Fury, she's been assigned to the Coulson's team in the Bus. She carries many secrets, and any one of them could get her arrested and thrown out. This is the second part of my Infinity Stones series. The first is called The Avengers, and unless you have read it, you won't understand.
1. Prologue:The Team

**A/N:**

**I'm back everyone! And now Paige moves on to the next cycle in her life in the Marvel Universe as Whiplash (and I know that the original Whiplash was evil and tried to kill Tony, but I don't care! The codename suits here!) and we get to follow her adventures!**

**Also, I have decided to call this series the Infinity Stones series!**

**Disclaimer: **

"**This is Paige. Angel does not own anything that is Marvel's. Why am I doing this again?"**

**Because you love me, Paige!**

-:-

When I woke up, vivid images of missions from the past still fresh in my mind, my back was pressed against the wall completely. It was a habit I had picked up after my first couple of missions. My first one had been simple—get in, get the intel, and get out—but the agent I was paired with to watch my back had failed to notice the enemy tailing us the first twenty minutes in. While hacking into the mainframe, Agent Harrow took a bullet to the shoulder and froze up. Still, I had been determined to get the job done. I wasn't going to fail. While fighting, I took two bullets—one to the side (I was luck there was no serious damage) and one to the thigh. I managed to drag Harrow outside, where I contacted evac, bit was loosing too much blood. By the time Clint and Natasha arrived, I was just about dead. But I had the intel and saved Harrow. Of course, I went into surgery and then was in a coma for three weeks. When I woke up, Clint was pacing around my room in the Med Bay, looking like he was about to kill someone. Natasha was sitting in a chair, eyes following him, but when I shifted, they both turned to look at me.

Despite their obvious relief that I wasn't dead, I got a tongue-lashing from the both of them (as did Agent Harrow and Fury, I was told later), and after I was fully recovered, a month of kitchen duty. The second mission I was paired with Agent Mayne, and it went perfectly until evac couldn't pick us up until the next day. We were given a room in a nearby hotel, and Mayne was taking a shower. I had just settled down with my back to the door when it flew open and a knife had sunk into the back of my shoulder and dragged downwards.

Needless to say, I had begun sleeping with my back to the wall.

Rolling out of bed and stretching, I took a shower before loosening up with some yoga. I then pulled my hair back into a messy bun with a single braid left down to hang. I fingered it gently before continuing with my routine. Changing into a pair of dark jeans and a blue long sleeved shirt with a v-neck and pulling on a pair of combat boots, I coiled my whip around my waist and headed down to the mess hall for breakfast. Snagging a muffin and a cold bottle of milk, I ran into Agent Jensen, whose first name was Clara.

"Good morning," she said. "Agents Romanoff and Barton are over there expecting you." I thanked her and moved to the table where she pointed. My SOs were indeed waiting for me with expectant expressions—which is to say, no expression on their faces at all.

"Fury is expecting you on the launch pad by noon," were the first words out of Clint's mouth. I sat down and took a bite out of my muffin. Fury's warning was ringing in my ears—not that I had any intention of telling anyway.

"Is that so?" I asked, snagging my milk back from Natasha, who had tried to take a swallow. While Natasha liked to seem like the Ice Queen from the seventh circle of Hell, she did like to steal my (and Clint's) food and eat it. "Natasha, stop it. If you wanted milk, you should've gotten your own."

"Yeah," Clint continued, ignoring us. "The thing is, he wouldn't give me any details other than you're going to be working with a mobile team for a while. Any insights?"

"No," I lied. "But if Fury says I'm working with a team, then I'm working with a team. I'll check in when possible, keep up with my schoolwork, and train on my own. Besides, we all know my teamwork skills need some tuning up."

"Paige," Clint warned. "What are you hiding?"

"Your knife from Cambodia," I replied, secreting his favorite knife into my combat boot. "Now if you'll excuse me, I have school to attend to and a mission to pack for." Before they could say anything else, I was up and walking away from the table. Before going to Fury's office, I stopped at Clint's quarters and dropped off his knife. It I took it with me, he'd hunt me down, which could lead to him seeing Coulson alive and that wouldn't do. I then swiftly made my way to the Director's office.

Like last night, I knocked twice and waited for him to call me in. He glared at me and heaved a sigh, causing me to hide a smirk. I could really irritate Fury, because he knew I was right and couldn't come up with an argument that I couldn't counter. Clint and Natasha's training had only furthered my ability to do so.

"You wanted to see me, sir? Something about a mission?" I really shouldn't have goaded him. Oops. Too late now.

"You're being assigned to Coulson's mobile team for the time being," he said stiffly. Again, I hid a smirk. "You are not obligated to stay with them all the time, and you will be pulled off for other missions as needed. I don't suppose you'll stay with them all the time anyway, will you?" I shook my head no. Of course I wasn't going to stay there all the time. Things to do, places to go, people to see. I was a very busy agent, you know. Between schoolwork, training, missions, making sure that fate runs its course… let's just say that my life was never dull.

"Very well. Since you are aware of his situation, I want you to assist Agent Melinda May in observing his condition. I assume you don't need to be briefed?" Again, I shook my head no. "Good. You're to meet them on the Bus by noon. I assume that Agents Barton and Romanoff…"

"Don't know any details other that what you told them, sir," I finished. "If I may, who else is on this team?" Not that I didn't already know, of course. Just playing it up so they were a little less suspicious of me. Or not. Either way, they had gotten used to it by now.

"Agent Coulson and Agent My you already know," Fury started, flipping through some files. "On the team there will also be agent Leo Fitz, Agent Jemma Simmons, and Agent Grant Ward." He showed me their files.

"Sir," I said, "it says here that Agents Fitz and Simmons aren't cleared for field work."

"Agents Fitz and Simmons are the top of their class, Agent Willows," Fury said sharply. "I expect they will adapt. However there are four other agents capable of field work on this team including you. I they'll be well looked after."

"Sir, Agent May… she said she won't be doing any field work. Not since Bahrain."

"Agent May has already agreed to go as the pilot, as she is complying with my orders to keep a close eye on Agent Coulson. Do you have any further questions, Agent Willows?"

"I shook my head. "No, sir."

"Good. You leave at noon. I expect your schoolwork to be done and your bags packed before then. You have four hours. Dismissed."

"Yes, sir," I said as I turned around and left. When the door closed behind me, I muttered, "Grandpa Fury." I quickly made my way to my quarters, not leaving any chance for me to run into Clint or Natasha.

-:-

After finishing with school, I gathered up two duffel bags One I filled with clothes and personal belongings, such as my sketchpad and journal. Since the Battle of New York, I had begun to keep a journal on everything that I knew and went through. Maybe someday someone would read it. Drawing was something I had sort of fallen into, as I drew my feelings and dreams that particularly bothered me. Natasha told me it was my coping device for everything that I do and see that bother me. The second bag was filled with weapons. Some were from other countries, some I'd had made specifically for me, and others I'd made myself. I was actually pretty smart, even if I didn't get technical with the terms. I wasn't FitzSimmons or Bruce Banner or Tony Stark smart, but I knew enough to make my own. After all, if I can turn a Zippit pencil pouch into a weapon and use it to kill aliens, I can't be too bad at making my own. I still had an hour. I used that time to work out, practicing with knives, guns, and my whip of course.

The new agents watched me, bit I paid them no attention. Soon my lithe body was covered in sweat, and the hair that has come loose stuck to my neck and forehead. The long, braided strand whipped around, but it was of no hindrance to me, so I ignored it. My body did the motions without thinking. My thoughts were elsewhere. The team on the Bus was just getting gathered. Coulson… he had been dead for days until they were able to bring him back to life, and then they kept him under surveillance to make sure he was fine. I wondered what other lies they told him to keep him from asking too many questions.

Suddenly, my whip was yanked from my grasp.

"You're not focusing," Natasha said, picking up my whip. "When you don't focus, you die. Keep your thoughts on the battle at hand—not the one in your head. Understand?"

I rolled my eyes, holding out my hand for my weapon. "Yes, Mum. Jeez, it was just practice. I have to go anyway and grab a shower before I head to meet my new team." As she handed me my whip, Natasha gave me a stern look.

"You're keeping secrets, Paige. I understand about where you came from, but you've never kept secrets about missions. Want to tell me why you're starting now?" Natasha asked.

I met her green gaze. "If I could tell you, I would. That's all you have to know. I'm sorry, Tasha." I called her by her nickname quietly, aware of the new recruits nearby and her reluctance to show weakness in front of them. They already challenged her, Clint, and I too much already. I sometimes trained the new recruits, but mostly showed them around. Usually Natasha and Clint used me as an example of what they could become if they worked hard.

After giving me a long, hard stare, Natasha nodded. "Check in whenever you can." I nodded. She saw the gratitude in my eyes that she let the subject go. I didn't like keeping secrets from them (and the whole knowing-the-future thing already made me keep too many) and they didn't like letting things go easily. Checking the time, I rushed to my quarters and took a quick shower, changing into another pair of jeans—black this time—and a blue long sleeved shirt. I slid on a black leather jacket, combat boots again, holstered a gun to my thigh, slipped a knife into each boot, and coiled my whip around my waist. I had mastered that trick a while ago—disguising my whip to look like a belt—and was now able to pull it out quickly when needed. Perfect for undercover ops that could get dicey. I left my wet hair down this time, and quickly rebraided the one strand. I only took it out when I showered and then immediately put it back in afterward. I grabbed my duffel bags and quickly headed down to the launch pad. I was directed to the Bus, where I chose my bunk. It was the farthest away from everyone else's. I knew which one was Coulson's because it already ha his stuff in it. This bunk was tucked in a corner, and I knew that if anyone on this plane (and man, it was a _really_ nice plane) were to get trapped by enemies and have to fight their way out, I was probably the better one. May would only fight if necessary (to begin with, anyway) and Ward wouldn't choose this one anyway.

I unpacked quickly, putting weapons where I deemed necessary and sliding the rest under the bed.

All that was left was for the rest of the team to arrive.

-:-

**And there we go! Chapter 2 out of 3 done! Next one soon! Please send me your love!**

**Love,**

**Angel**


	2. Pilot

**A/N:**

**This is the first episode of Agents of SHIELD season one, everybody! Hope you enjoy. I'm sorry for no shout outs, but it's because these are posted one after another with no time.**

**Disclaimer: **

**These things are oh so tedious. You know the stinking drill.**

-:-

I didn't have to wait long for FitzSimmons to come aboard, lugging suitcases of personal belonging, but most of the bags contained weapons and experiments if I was willing to bet everything I had. They were struggling to get everything up the loading ramp, so I made my way down to help them.

"Ah—be extremely careful with that, yeah?" Fitz said as I picked up a black duffel bag.

"Sure," I replied readily, handling it even more gently than I had been before and picked up a suitcase in my other one. "I take it you're FitzSimmons." We stopped outside of the lab and I carefully set down the bags.

"He's Fitz."

"She's Simmons. I'm engineering, she's biochem." Both of them turned to face me, seeing my face for the first time, and froze in shock.

"You're Paige Willows," Jemma Simmons said in her British accent just like mine. "You came here in the middle of the Battle at New York by some unknown source. Do you have any idea what it was?" she started moving out to get more things. Yeah, I had some idea. The problem was, I wasn't willing to share.

"I'm not a scientist," I said. "I'm just an Avenger. And I'm assigned to this team for a while. Nice to meet you both. Do you still need me?"

"Whoa whoa whoa whoa whoa—shit, that's the Night-Night gun," Fitz cried as he saw Simmons lifting up a rather large gun, totally forgetting about my question. He ran out of the lab and took it from her, cradling it to his chest like a baby.

"Well, it's on my stuff and it doesn't work and there's no way we're calling it the 'Night-Night gun,'" Simmons replied, lifting up her bags.

"The bullets work," Fitz insisted. "Non-lethal, heavy stopping power, break up under the sub-contentious tension—"

"Oh, and I'm supposed to do this with one-point microleaks of dendryl toxin? I'm not Hermione, I can't create instant paralysis with that," Simmons cut in. "You should've run the specs by me before you started building the model." They broke into an argument about the things I couldn't quite follow. And Fitz's accent was really throwing me off. Agent Grant Ward stopped at the entrance to the la, looked back and forth between the bickering scientists, and dropped his bag, which landed heavily on the floor and broke up the argument.

"FitzSimmons?" He asked, his voice irritated. Wow, he really did not like working in teams.

"Fitz." Simmons pointed to Fitz.

"Simmons." Fitz pointed to Simmons. "I'm engineering, she's biochem." They were so cute, honestly. About a head shorter than I was, with no physical evidence of muscles. They were adorable! It was too bad, really, knowing what would happen.

Ward's eyes turned to me. "Paige Willows," he said, and nodded his head in mutual respect. I nodded back.

"One of the few perks of being famous is that I don't have to introduce myself unless undercover," I sighed. "I like it. You're Grant Ward, correct?" he nodded and held out a comm receiver to Fitz.

"Agent Coulson said I needed my comm receiver encoded. I don't know if you've worked with that model before. It's—" he cut off as Fitz began hitting the comm with a hammer. "—brand new."

"He'll repurpose the IDIS chip," Simmons said, writing. She didn't even look up.

"You don't need the external receiver for the inner-ear comms anymore," Fitz explained, examining the chip.

"Well uh, how does it—" poor Ward had no idea what hit him as Simmons ran up to him with a swab, shoved it in his mouth, and collected his DNA.

"Embedded sensory neurals can match through your DNA," she said. "It's very posh."

"I need to upgrade your comm as well," Fitz said after he had set down the chip. I obediently handed my comm link over. He started smashing it with a hammer. At least I knew what was coming. It was one I had stolen from tech specifically for that reason. My real one was in my bunk, where it was safe and I could use it to contact Clint and Natasha.

"So, are you excited to be coming on our journey into mystery?" Simmons asked Ward, collecting a new swab and moving over to me. Again, I obediently opened my mouth, stifling my natural reaction to scrunch up my face at the strange taste and texture.

"Like Christmas," Ward said, and Simmons didn't seem to notice the sarcasm. She smiled happily and moved on. For a genius, she was sure oblivious sometimes.

I moved over to stand next to Ward and whispered, "Never let techies mess with the stuff you really like. Next time, steal one from the labs and give them that." Before he could reply, the sound of squealing tires made us turn to look. It was Coulson pulling up in Lola, an antique convertible with hover wheels.

"One of Coulson's old SHIELD collectibles," Fitz said. He rambled on about a GPS, but I was too busy watching as a worker came up, put his hand out, only to be reprimanded by the man in charge.

"Don't touch Lola."

"And he calls it a girl's name," Fitz laughed, slapped Ward on the back, and walked away. I had to resist laughing at Ward's obvious discomfort. I knew his people skills were horrible (and that Maria Hill has drawn what she thought to be a porcupine, but Coulson had translated as a little poop with knives sticking out of it).

"You two follow me," he said. Ward and I did as we were told, following him upstairs. "Lola's not just a collectible, you know. People confuse old and improved." The plane, as I said before, was beautiful. Gorgeous. Nice decorations, full bar (even though I was underage), very homey. Coulson was still talking, but I tuned him out. This was supposed to be the mobile command, but then they got the Hellicarrier. More space, more agents onboard. Ward didn't get Coulson's joke about a man who was afraid of heights.

And then we were joined by Agent Melinda May. "If you plan to unpack, make it quick. Wheels are up in five," she told Ward before talking to Coulson. "We may have a hit on one of the Rising Tide's routing points." She handed him a binder.

"Good," Coulson said. "We need to do some catching up." May started to walk away. As she passed me, I slipped the note Fury had given me to inform her of my additional help on keeping an eye on Coulson.

Ward watched her walk away. "Is that… who I think it is?"

Coulson barely glanced up from the binder in his hands. "She's just the pilot," he said before going back to reading. I nearly laughed out loud at Ward's incredulous expression. I knew May, I had met her on my first day at the Hellicarrier, where she looked me up and down in a way that said she thought I wasn't going to make it more than a month. I politely told her that she could believe what she wanted about me, but I was going to make it through SHIELD training and one day be on her team. Needless to say, I had been right.

"Melinda May is just the pilot," Ward stated disbelievingly. "Come on, sir. What game are you really playing?"

Coulson just said, "Better stow your gear." Before walking away, motioning for me to follow him to his office. I did, leaving behind a stunned Ward. Once inside, I looked around to see all of Coulson's collectibles already in place. The Bus powered up and was getting ready to move.

"Agent Willows," Coulson said.

"Sir," I acknowledged, retaining my manners. Technically he was still my superior, as I was only a Level Six agent and he was Level Eight.

"Director Fury assigned you last minute," he informed me. "As one of the Avengers, I was surprised by this. Especially since Agent Barton was your SO."

"I can keep secrets, sir," I said. "Even from Clint and Natasha. Plus, I wasn't there when you died. I came a little bit after that. Director Fury seems to think I need to work on my teamwork skills."

"You don't agree?" Coulson asked, setting the binder down on his desk and sitting down.

"No, I completely agree," I said. "I know they need work. I'm willing to do whatever it takes to become the best agent I can be."

He nodded. "Directory Fury has informed me that you have a temporary Level Eight badge and that you will not stay here full-time. You will be pulled off for other assignments, yes?" I nodded in confirmation. "Good. I assume you've already unpacked and chosen your bunk. Here is everything we have on the Rising Tide." He handed me a file, which I took and turned to leave. "Oh, and one last thing, Agent Willows." I waited. "There is a piano onboard." I smiled and left. Fury knew me well and made sure there was something to keep me occupied so I didn't get into mischief.

-:-

"May, you're going with Fitz and Simmons to check out the explosion site," Coulson said after we had touched down at our location. I had changed into my uniform, which was a black catsuit with blue accents and, _ugh_, heeled combat boots, and pulled my hair back into a severe high ponytail. "Agents Ward, Willows, you're with me. We're going to find the routing point and whoever is running it." With our orders, we all climbed into our respective vehicles and left. I had called shotgun before Ward could say a word, and Coulson had me enter in the coordinates into the GPS.

We parked behind one of the buildings that created the alley that Skye's van was parked in. "Ward, only use force if necessary. We're apprehending. Paige, make sure no one sees." We nodded and climbed out. I followed them to a point where I could see both ends of the alley and still see what was going on with them. After Ward had picked the lock, Coulson flung the door open, cutting the Rising Tide hacker woman off mid sentence.

"Hey," she said after a brief pause. "What up?" In one swift movement, Ward had a bag—where on earth did he pull that out of?—over Skye's head and was pulling her out of the van. I covered the three as Ward settled her in the SUV.

When we had parked, Ward pulled Skye out of the van and led her into the Bus, the bag still over her head. Coulson ordered me to stay out of the Cage and wait for any news from May. While I waited, I watched the video feed on a tablet. Ward yanked the bag off of Skye's head and sat her down in one of the metal chairs.

"You guys are making a big mistake," she said as soon as she could. She was panting a little bit from having the bag on.

"You don't look that big," Ward replied, and despite his lacking humor, it was a pretty good comeback.

"Sorry for the lack of finesse," Coulson said. "Agent Ward here has had a little history with your group, the Rising Tide."

Skye tried to deny that she knew what that was, but Ward cut her off. "Okay, there are two ways we can do this."

"Oh, and is one of them the easy way?" Skye quipped, using deflection to try and hide the fact that she was nervous and scared. None of us bought it.

"No," Ward said, making Skye deflate a little bit. Settling back further into the comfy chair, I pulled my legs up beside me and rested the tablet on them.

"What's your Name?" Coulson asked.

Skye hesitated for a moment, obviously trying to come up with a fake name but coming up empty. "Skye."

"What's your _real_ name?" Ward clarified. Skye turned to look at him.

"It can wait," Coulson decided. "It's another name we need. A certain hero." Despite the angle of the camera and the darkness of the room, I saw recognition flash in Skye's eyes at the mention of the Hooded Hero. Mike Peterson. And if I saw it, ward and Coulson definitely did.

"What makes you think I know that?" she asked, deflecting again.

"Well, you made a little mistake," Coulson said, sitting down in the second metal chair across the metal table from the self-proclaimed hacktivist. "The phone you filmed the "Hooded Hero" with had the same cryptographic signature as a few of the Rising Tide posts." He dropped a file in front of her.

"Wow," Skye said, looking between the two agents. "Yeah, was that a mistake, or am I now sitting in the center of your secret headquarters? What is this, a plane? I got inside. And by now you've discovered that you can't beat the encryption software on my equipment so… you got _nothing_." While I wasn't a computer genius, I bet I could give her encryption software a run for its money. That I had been trained to do by Natasha, who specialized in everything from assassination to espionage to hacking. Some of the very few perks of being trained in the KGB, I guess.

"We have a fairly strong coincidence," Coulson corrected her. "You being on the scene right before it went up in flames." He showed her a picture in the file, but I couldn't see what it was. "Want to tell me what my team is going to find there? How did you know the hooded man was going to be there?"

"Did you blow it up? To draw him out?" ward asked, cutting Coulson off.

"Did you?" Skye asked accusingly, offended.

"That's not our style," Coulson said, shaking his head slightly.

" I was just kidnapped by your "style." SHIELD covered up New Mexico, Project Pegasus, of course you'd be covering up Centipede," Skye said. Coulson glanced at Ward, who scratched his temple and mouthed back, "Centipede?" Skye looked back and forth between the two, before coming to a conclusion.

"Holy no way," she said smugly. "You don't know what that is. _Billions _of dollars of equipment at your disposal and I beat you with a laptop I won in a bet?" Now she was pushing it.

"You need to think of your friend," Coulson advised her. "We're not the only ones interested in people with powers. We'd like to contain him, yeah, but the next guy will want to exploit him, and the guy after that will want to dissect him."

Ward moved up and leaned on the table to look into Skye's face. "What is Centipede?"

Skye stood up and began to move around while she talked. "Centipede. It was chatter on the web, and then it was gone. I tracked the access point back-address to that building."

"What are you after?" Ward asked.

Skye turned to look at him, annoyed. "The truth. What are you after?"

"World peace. You psuedo-anarchist hacker types love to start things up, but you're never around for the fallout. People keep secrets for a reason, _Skye_," ward ranted, moving to stand in front of the woman.

"Well, just because you're reasonable and—" Skye poked Ward's chest a couple of times. "—firm, doesn't mean you're not a cruel, faceless, evil government toolbag." I chuckled out loud at that.

"Just give us your guy's name," Ward said, exasperated.

"He's not my guy," Skye said, irritated now.

"You understand he's in danger," Coulson cut in from his place, still seated in the chair, making the other two turn to look at him.

"Then let me go," Skye insisted. "Me, not the T-one thousand here." Again, I laughed out loud. I loved Skye so much.

"You want to be alone with him," Ward said, irritated himself. "Of course. She's a groupie. All this hacking into SHIELD, tracking powers, she might as well be one of those sweaty cos-play girls running around the Stark Tower."

"_What_?" Skye asked. "I would nev—it was one time." For money, no doubt. And I don't really think she would've done it if it weren't necessary. Coulson stood up and headed for the door.

"Ward," he said before leaving. The specialist followed. I looked up from the tablet in my hands as they came out, standing up with the tablet in my hand.

"No news from May," I told Coulson s I headed for my bunk. He nodded. As I passed Ward, I murmured, "Nicely done, tiger. Next time, why don't you just kill her and be done?" he had completely blown that interrogation, and I knew Coulson was now going to question him about it. I settled myself in my bunk, closing the door as Coulson and Ward came back into view.

"This is QNB-three-sixteen," Coulson said, holding up a vial of clear liquid. "It's the top-shelf martini of sodium penthonal derivatives. It's brand new and extremely potent truth drug." Ward made sure Skye stayed in her seat. "Don't worry. The effects only last about an hour."

Ward was entirely too smug. "Then you'll have a nice little nap, and we'll have all the answers we nee—ack, hey!" Coulson had plunged the needle into ward's arm, and I decided to head back out. I couldn't pick up calls to the Bus from my bunk, and I did have orders to wait for news from May. "Gah, what the hell?" Ward demanded, holding his arm and staring at Coulson incredulously for the second time today. I sat down in my previous spot.

"I'm sorry, did that hurt?" Coulson asked calmly, and I laughed again.

"No," Ward said loudly, letting go of his arm. "But you've lost your mind. You should never do that to a member of your team and _yes_, it did hurt a little bit but I always try and mask my pain in front of beautiful women because I think it makes me seem more masculine—my _god_, this stuff works fast." He sat down in the second chair.

"Don't trust us?" Coulson asked, capturing Skye's attention. "Ask him whatever you like." And with that, he left, ignoring Ward's words of protest. "Paige, you're free to do what you want," he told me and I nodded, not moving just yet.

Skye had slid off her jacket. "You seem nervous, Agent Ward." I saw his eyes flicker downward before back up to her face.

"I'm calling to mind my training," he replied as she stood up and began circling around the table to stand next to him. "There's no way I'm going to reveal classified secrets to a girl who's hell-bent on taking us down."

"Have you ever killed anyone?" Skye asked.

"Yes, a few," Ward said before realizing what he did. "High-risk targets. But they were terrible people who were trying to hurt nice people. I didn't feel good afterwards."

"And does your grandmother know about these things?" Skye asked. Ward's face and voice were comical as he said,

"Gramsy?" Laughing, I disconnected the feed and turned off the tablet. Leaving it on the coffee table, I headed off to find the piano. It was beautiful. Glossy black and a baby grand at that. Fury was really trying to keep me out of mischief for him to spring for something like this. Sitting down on the bench, I ran my fingers lovingly over the ivory keys, loving every minute of it. Calling to mind a few pieces I'd memorized. As I had taken piano for nine years in London, I began to play, notes and tones flowing and turning into music. It was the theme for the Phantom of the Opera.

I played for the next hour.

-:-

I was with Coulson when Skye emerged from the Cage, Ward passed out with his face on the table. She told Coulson what she had learned from Agent Ward, how he'd been to Paris and yet never seen it, wished he'd stayed in Tahiti, and that he didn't like Coulson's style. Coulson showed her the newsclip of Mike assaulting the foreman in the factory he had worked at.

"This isn't right, he's…" Skye trailed off briefly. "He just needs a break."

"The give him one," Coulson told her. "What have you got?"

When May and FitzSimmons had returned, Coulson placed Mike's driver's license that Skye had produced on the table and scanned it.

"Michael Peterson, factory worker," Coulson said as we gathered around. "Married, one kid. Gets injured, gets laid off, wife jumps ship. Good guy, bad breaks. Best guess is, somebody tells him they can make him strong again, make him super."

"Who has the tech to do that?" May asked. "And why would they want to?"

"Fitz, what do we have from the security footage before the blast?" Coulson asked the engineering genius. With a few taps, an image came up on a screen.

"What are we seeing?" May and I asked at the same time, our faces and stances identical. I hadn't meant to do that, and I typically tried to avoid doing it.

"Well, the mean is angry… at the other man," Fitz said, and I wanted to roll my eyes and say, "excellent work, Watson!"

"The data was very corrupt," Simmons cut in, seeing the looks on our faces.

"Yeah, like Cold War Russia corrupt," Fitz added. "I can't sync the time code without—"

"What if you had the audio?" Skye cut in. "I was running surveillance on the lab. I had my shock pointed at the window before the blast. The digital file's in my van. There's too much background noise for me, but you could prob—" Simmons cut Skye off, and the two scientists had a brief conversation that none of the rest of us really followed.

Finally, Fitz said, "That would do very well, thank you very much."

Coulson looked at Skye. "Your van's here, but you were right. We couldn't decrypt the files."

"The encryption's coupled to the GPS," Skye said. "Get my van back to that alley and then I'm in business."

"Agents May and Willows will escort you," Coulson said and May and I led the way out. "And on your way out, wake up Ward." I smirked, remembering where the specialist was and how he had gotten there.

-:-

Once in the alley, Skye set to work. She was using a borrowed comm to talk to Fitz, yammering on in a technical language I only half understood. May was waiting outside, keeping watch, while I was inside behind Skye. She knew what she was doing. When she thought neither of us was looking, she grabbed a SD card and hid it in her bra.

"That should do it," Skye said, closing the laptop.

"Let's head back," May said. Suddenly, a figure dropped down and knocked May out of commission.

"Mike," was the last thing I heard before the man slammed my head into the floor of the van and everything went black.

-:-

When I woke up, I was immediately sitting up and looking at my surroundings.

"Whoa, whoa, whoa," a voice said, and I whipped around to see Simmons coming into the lab. The movement caused a sharp pain to shoot through my skill. "Easy! You took quite a blow to your head. Very lucky you don't have a fracture in your skull." She pushed me back so I was laying sown. She looked at a screen, checking my vitals.

"Mike!" I realized, sitting up again and wincing at the pain. "Skye, May!"

"What did I say?" Simmons chastised, staring at me until I laid back down. "They're fine. We created something to stop the Centipede serum. Skye is fine. So is May. Just—lie—still, would you? I'll give you something to cut the pain." She pushed a needle into my skin, and I felt the drug rush through my bloodstream and start to take immediate effect. I sighed.

"Okay, you can sit up now," Simmons said. "The rest of the team is out here." I followed her out to where Ward and Fitz were. "Skye and Coulson are dropping Mike's son at his mother's." Suddenly, an alert came up on the laptop. Simmons grabbed a beer (nasty stuff. I much preferred wine, but as I was underage, I didn't drink unless on a mission).

"It's a mission," Ward said, opening up the file. "An oh-eight-four."

"Call Coulson," I said, snatching a few fries from the table. Ward pulled out his phone and informed our team leader.

Oh yeah, this was going to be fun.

-:-

**Oh my goodness, this took **_**FOR-FREAKING-EVER**_** to type up! My Kindle kept dying on me so I'd have to plug it in and wait for an hour to get some life back! Next chapter on Friday!**

**Love,**

**Angel**


	3. 0-8-4

**A/N:**

**HAPPY NEW YEAR! I'm posting early just because it's a holiday and I missed Christmas!**

**I'm back along with Paige, Coulson, and the rest of the team! I have to say that these chapters are much longer than any of them in **_**The Avengers**_**, so it takes a lot longer for me to get them down. But longer chapters means happier viewers, so I'm willing to suffer the pain.**

**Shout outs to **_**Rubi Yuki**_**, my first reviewer on this story! Love all the love, hon! Thank you! Also to **_**AoSFanatic**_**, so here is your update!**

**Disclaimer:**

**-_- I don't own anything from Marvel. Paige is mine.**

-:-

As we flew to our next destination, I took the time to catch up on my studies. My Italian wasn't going to just magically appear in my brain, unfortunately, and Natasha would kill me if I didn't keep up with it. Speaking of Natasha, I should probably check in with her and Clint. Setting my workbook aside, I turned on a call screen.

"Romanoff, Natasha, Level Seven," I said, and it began to connect the call immediately. I knew that if she wasn't on a mission, she'd be at her house, and Clint would most likely be with her.

Sure enough, her image popped up onscreen, red hair wild and wearing a SHIELD-issue tank top. "_Kotenok_," she greeted me, and I smiled a little at her nickname. It had taken me a while to figure out how to spell it, and then a little longer to figure out what it meant, but she was basically calling me "kitten" in Russian. When I asked her why, she just shrugged and said, "Because you growl and act all fierce when someone new comes around, but really, you just want your belly rubbed. And you're tiny." In all honesty, I wasn't that much shorter than she was, but I had let the subject drop.

"Just checking in," I informed her. "Where's Clint?"

"Training the new batch of agents," she replied, scrutinizing my appearance. Her eyes locked on the nasty bump on my head that had gone down quite a bit, but was still tender. Her emerald green eyes flashed murderously. "Explain." Her voice brooked no argument.

"Tasha, deep breath," I said calmly. Usually she tried to pretend that she didn't have attachments, but when someone she cared about got hurt, she got homicidal. She sucked in a deep breath and let it out slowly. "Some guy juiced up on a supersoldier serum attacked me with May. It's just a bump. No concussion, nothing serious."

The deprogrammed Russian spy gave me a long, hard stare. "You're with Melinda?" I nodded, knowing what was going through her head. May was probably going to get a call from Natasha asking her to keep an eye on me. "Anyone else I would know?"

My thoughts immediately went to Coulson, but I stayed quiet and said instead, "Grant Ward." Tasha's lip curled in disgust. Clara had told me that when Ward first arrived in SHIELD, he had taken a fancy to Natasha. After a week of her blatantly ignoring him and showing no signs of giving up, Natasha had politely told him to back off. In other words, she pinned him to a wall and got personal. Since, he avoided her, and Natasha (and Clint, for that matter) had never forgiven him.

"Keep an eye on him, Paige," she told me. "And keep up with your schoolwork. I'll tell Clint you called."

"Bye, Tasha." She ended the call, and I laid back on my pillows. It was times like this that I wondered about my mum and brother, Danny. He would be fourteen now. Did he miss me? Was I even missing at home? I was no closer to answers than I had been three years ago after crash-landing into the middle of a war. Yeah, my timing really sucks, doesn't it?

There was a knock on my door. "It's Skye."

"Come on it." The door opened and the woman stepped in. Since moving in, Skye had kind of gravitated towards me. I assumed it was because I was as close to the normalcy she was looking for as she was going to find on this plane. Ward was, in a sense, a robot. May was closed off. Coulson was distant. FitzSimmons… were just plain weird, most of the time. Skye was just looking for a friend who sort of knew what having a normal life was like. I had almost fourteen years of one.

"Hey. Who were you talking to?" she asked, standing awkwardly in the doorway. I motioned for her to come in and sit, which she did.

"Just one of the agents who are in charge of my training. I guess you could call her my handler," I replied. "Anyway, we'd better get out there and get ready to go."

-:-

Not maybe two hours earlier, I had followed Coulson, May, and Ward into the briefing room, where May and Ward continued to argue against Coulson's decision to let Skye tag along.

"Skye? That girl's not qualified to be a SHIELD agent," Ward said.

"Agreed," Coulson replied. "That's why I've invited her on as a consultant. SHIELD does it all the time. Technically, Stark's a consultant." I was silent for the moment, simply watching everything unfold. Skye was busy unpacking her van, so there was no chance of her hearing this.

"And technically, Skye's a member of the Rising Tide. She hacked our RSA implementation," Ward argued.

"Twice," Coulson clarified. "From a laptop. Imagine what she'll do with our resources."

"I am. That's exactly what I'm imagining during this frown," Ward countered. May, like me, was silent and watching how it played out. For now. "You brought me on for risk assessment. She's a risk." Ward leaned towards Coulson. "She doesn't think like us."

"Exactly," Coulson said.

"We have three kids on this Bus, and two of them aren't cleared for combat. Now you're adding a third," May said, almost incredulously. I was just the tiniest bit offended at being called a kid (even though it was true), but her saying I was cleared for combat sort of made up for it.

"At least FitzSimmons are trained SHIELD scientists," ward said. "And Paige is cleared for combat. But Skye? You said this was a select team. Assembled to work new cases, to protect people. I don't see how letting some hacker tag along—"

"You're looking for an objection I haven't already anticipated," Coulson said, finally irritated. "I'm calling this, but your frown will be on record."

"We've been called to investigate an 0-8-4, you know what that means," Ward said. Technically, I was a 0-8-4. An object of unknown origins. Well, unknown to them, but not necessarily unknown to me.

"Yes, we do. It means… we don't know what it means," Coulson said, making the corner of my mouth turn up. He handed May a tablet, and she walked off just as Fitz, Simmons, and Skye came upstairs looking for the bunks.

A few minutes later, May's voice came on over the intercom. "_Wheel's up in two. Lock it or loose it._" Ward left to give a safety pamphlet to Skye, and Coulson turned to look at me with a sigh.

"I assume you have some complaints of your own," he said.

"You shouldn't assume anything about me, sir," I replied. "I have no complaints." Coulson gave me a long, hard stare, which reminded me so much of Clint and Natasha. So that is where they had learned that from.

"That's right. You were trained by Natasha. Well then, better get settled in." He turned and began to leave the room, probably headed for his office.

"They miss you, you know," I said quietly.

He paused. "I know. But they can't know. Not yet." And then he left. I waited a few minutes before following him out. Heading back to my bunk, I downed some painkillers, twisting my hair into a knot on top of my head and sticking a couple of decorative chopsticks through to hold it in place. Natasha was the one who taught me style, and I never went anywhere without accessories. I then made my way to the cockpit and strapped myself in beside May.

Neither of us said anything. Not for a long while. I knew that if a conversation was going to take place, May had to be the one to start it. Finally, she said, "Fury put you onboard." I immediately knew she was talking about Coulson. The message really was, _You know about TAHITI_.

"Last minute assignment," I replied. _He didn't have a choice_.

"And now you're here." _How did you know_?

"I usually work alone or with a partner. I need to work on group skills." _We all have secrets. This one's mine_.

-:-

We landed in Peru two hours later; within that time I had contacted Natasha to let her know I was fine, even though the bump on my head certainly didn't help convince her of that. After receiving orders, we all piled into the SUVs and drove into a dig site. I climbed out, looking around.

"Tire tracks forty meters back," Ward said as soon as he got out. "I'll check them against the site's trucks, make sure we're alone."

"Too much exposure here," May said as she looked around. "I'm gonna find a place to park."

"Something feels off," I muttered, my hand sliding to the whip coiled around my waist. Fitz and Simmons were chattering on about monkeys (surprise, surprise) as we made our way into an Incan temple. Skye asked about warning the locals about the potentially dangerous object, only to be shut down by Coulson.

"So what am I doing here?" Skye asked.

"Well, if something gets out, I might need you to create some kind of diversion," Coulson replied. "Put people on the wrong scent."

"So, _everything_ that I'm against," Skye said.

Coulson thought about it for a second. "Yep." And then he headed for the temple, leaving Skye standing there. I took a second to talk to her.

"You get used to it, eventually," I said.

"What, getting left behind?"

"No, the secrets," I replied. "I'm not saying that you shouldn't have personal morals, but you'll eventually learn how to bend those morals to fit the rules. That's what I do. Come on, we have work to do." Inside the temple was dark and dusty, but that wasn't what caught my attention: it was the metal contraption with blue lights stuck into the wall. It totally did not fit inside an ancient temple. Nope.

"Sir, I need you and your team to evacuate this site until we determine the risk associated with this object," Coulson was saying to the professor who had discovered the object. Fitz had started to take out the Dwarves. "Agent Willows will escort you out and make sure you and your team leave safely." One of the Dwarves—Sleepy, if I remembered correctly—flew right past the professor's face.

"Leave the man alone," Simmons chastised the robot.

"Now, for your own safety," Coulson said.

I stepped forward. "This way, professor," I said, letting him lead the way out of the temple. May was waiting outside. "I'm clearing out the team," I informer her before following the professor back to the camp. Ward passed us on the path. Once back where all the others were, I picked up a nearby bullhorn and turned it on,

"_Puedo tener su atencion, por favor! Todo el mundo es comenzar a empacar en preparencion para salir de este sitio immediamente_!" I yelled into it, and without question, the team began packing things up and into trucks. Suddenly, more trucks started streaming in. These weren't the site trucks. I looked to make sure the crew was well on their way before racing back towards the temple. May had two guys down and Ward had one.

"There's more," I rushed out, pulling the gun from my left thigh and my whip from my waist. "There's—" I didn't have time to finished before trucked pulled up and more guys with guns appeared. Ward held his guy in front of him as a shield and told May,

"You should've taken more guns." Suddenly, I saw the woman in charge and relaxed only slightly. Commandate Camilla Reyes. Ward radioed Coulson, who was out with us a few seconds later, talking in Spanish to the troops in front of us.

Camilla stopped at the bottom of the stairs and looked up at the man in charge with surprise. "Philip?"

Coulson looked equally surprised. "Camilla?" he gestured to her soldiers. "Do you mind?"

She shrugged. "After you." Ward begrudgingly let his shield go, May lowered her stolen guns, and I put my gun away, keeping my whip out. Camilla ordered her men to stand down, and they did immediately, and she made her way up to Phil. They greeted each other, and Camilla pressed a kiss to each of his cheeks.

"Agent Melinda May, Agent Grant Ward, Agent Paige Willows, this is Commandate Camilla Reyes," Coulson informed us, and proceeded to tell us her work agency. They used to work together back in the day, how sweet.

_Yep, totally sweet, right up until the part where she tries to kill everyone_, I then thought sarcastically.

"Let the team know everything's okay." Ward moved towards the entrance of the temple to complete his orders. _Compliance will be rewarded_. May followed him. I started to as well, but Coulson motioned for me to stay put.

"I know you found a strange object on Peruvian soil," Reyes said. "We should have a conversation on how to proceed."

"Of course," Coulson said readily. "But an oh-eight-four supersedes all national claims."

"You look good," Reyes complimented, probably hoping to work things out in her favor. Apparently, "back in the day" was too long ago and her memory was a bit hazy on Agent "Unflappable" Coulson.

All he said was, "I work out."

"Come, let me show you something," Reyes said, throwing an arm around his shoulders and leading him down the steps. I followed a couple feet behind, giving her men dubious glances and getting many hostile ones in return. Just as I thought. Camilla offered Coulson "the best chocolate in the world."

"Could've used some sugar," Coulson replied, handing the rest back to me. I took a nibble, and agreed even though the flavor was delicious. I slipped the chocolate into a bag and into my pocket.

Reyes laughed. "You Americans."

"You know me, Camilla," Coulson said. "I'm a simple guy."

"There was nothing "simple" about your last mission here," eyes replied, still smiling, the little witch. Okay, she was taller than me, but most people were. Only sixteen, duh!

"I had some great help," Coulson told her. I was edgy, because two of Reyes's goons were following along behind me where I couldn't see what they were doing. I hated not knowing what people were doing behind my back.

"There isn't any chance we get to keep the device, is there?" Reyes asked, finally cutting to the chase.

"It's not mine to give, but I'm sure we can find a way to resolve this," Coulson said. "Respectfully, in a way that gives your—" Coulson was cut off by an explosion behind us. I whipped around, and the goons began shooting.

"Rebels," Reyes hissed.

"Stay close, on my six," Coulson replied, drawing his gun. "Willows, get to the team and get Skye and FitzSimmons out safely!"

"Yes, sir," I said, pulling out my gun again and running full speed ahead toward the temple. Three rebels blocked my path. One went down with a bullet in the brain, another ran after loosing his gun from a flick of the whip in my hand, only to drop to the ground with a bullet in his calf, and the third dropped his gun and ran after I looked at him and said,

"Boo!" I kept running, shooting, and dodging explosions. How on earth did the rebels get explosives? I ducked inside the temple just in time to see Ward putting the 0-8-4 into a black duffel bag and Fitz freaking out.

"Skye, FitzSimmons, come on and stay close," I ordered. Skye handed Fitz a case, and she was the first one to follow Ward and I out the door. There were too many rebels surrounding the temple entrance. "Get down!" I yelled back to the "kids," who scrambled to do as I said. "Ward, you got the stick?"

"Of course," he replied, pulling it out and extending it. He slammed the point into the ground, and I ducked as the top came off, hovered in mid-air, and let loose an explosion that knock anyone standing to the ground. Ward stood up and grabbed the stick.

I looked back at the other three. "Come on! Hurry! Stay close!" Unfortunately, two of the three were weighed down with equipment, and were unable to get out of the way with any speed at all. There was a sniper, ready to shoot. I saw the SUV pulling up, and started running.

"Paige, what are you doing?" several people called out behind me. Just as May pulled up, blocking the bullets, I ran up the side of the van, flipping up onto the top of the vehicle, and fired off three shots. Three rebels, including the sniper, went down as lifeless bodies. There wasn't enough time for me to get in the van. I smacked the top of it twice, and May must've understood my message, because she hit the gas. If I hadn't held onto the rack for dear life, I would've went tumbling off. Still, I needed both hands to fight. I hit a button on the handle of my whip, and the handle extended and stretched, turning into a harness of sorts, and the whip part secured me to the rack on top. I pulled out a second gun and began shooting at rebels as we went.

Did I mention I had gotten a whole lot braver over the past three years?

Coulson and Reyes were in the truck directly behind us, and behind them was a truck filled with rebels who had machine guns. Really? Explosives _and_ machine guns? What was this, World War One? Sheesh! The ride was bumpy and fast, and I felt several bullets graze me. If I took the time to listen, I could hear faint yelling from inside the vehicle underneath me. Loose strands of hair were whipping around, and dust was flying into my face, forcing me to squish my eyes into slits and make it even harder to hit my targets. Suddenly, we were out in the open, which meant we had made it to the field where the Bus was waiting, hatch open. I ducked down as we flew up into the open hold, and then hit another button on my harness, which shrank back into a handle, unwrapping myself from the van and jumping down, startling Skye as she climbed out.

"You were on top that whole time?" she gasped as I hurried her and the scientists further into the plane.

"Yep, pretty much," I said. "Come on!" she saw that Ward was closing the ramp.

"What are you doing?" she demanded. "Coulson is still out there!"

"Get off the ramp, you're in the line of fire," Ward growled, and I followed him to keep firing at the rebels as Coulson, Reyes, and her goons fled toward the Bus. The gun in my left hand ran out of bullets, and I dropped it to the floor with a curse. Coulson made it on, and Ward left his post to follow him, but I stayed behind and helped three of Camilla's men cover us as the hatch began to shut. When I got back to my team, they were discussing the 0-8-4.

"You're saying that it's nuclear," Ward was saying.

"No," Coulson replied gravely. "It's much worse." They all scooted back from the thing a little further. Then he saw me: dusty, windblown out of breath, my catsuit covered in rips from bullets. "Willows, what were you thinking?" he demanded.

"I was thinking that if I took the time to get down off the van and inside I, we wouldn't have made it," I replied, wincing some as I coiled up my whip. "I planned accordingly from that point on."

"You could've been killed," he said.

"But I wasn't," I said. "Trained by Natasha, remember? Clint too." He was still angry, that much I could tell. "Hey, you told me to get them out safely. I did."

"I meant get yourself out safely as well," he said, stepping forward to support me as I made my way towards the lab to get patched up.

"I'm alive, aren't I?"

"Agent Willows, you will not take unnecessary risks, do you understand me?"

"Yes, sir," I said, not bothering to try and argue that the risk was necessary.

-:-

Nine bullet grazes. Luckily, only three needed stitches, and no more than three stitches we needed on the scratches. Needless to say, my body hurt. Nothing painkillers wouldn't fix, and I had doctor's orders not to strain myself until they've healed. Unfortunately, I wasn't going to get the chance to do that for a while. I was now sitting in the commons area, trying not to make any sudden movements. I was soon joined by Reyes and what was left of her men. She took a seat next to me.

"So, do you often ride on top of a car during a gun fight?" she asked, making me laugh a little, despite myself and my distrust for her. I winced a little as the movement pilled at the two grazes on my side.

"Not often, no," I replied. "Just when the situation calls for it."

"You look a little young to be in all of this," Reyes said, gesturing around the Bus. I debated on what I was able to tell her without giving too much information away or showing that I didn't trust her. I had to let fate run its course.

"Probably because I am," I said, taking a drink from the water bottle Coulson had given me. "I'm sixteen. But even though I have training, I don't have enough teamwork skills, so I get thrown on this plane with everyone else and someone Fury trusts completely to keep an eye on me. I like to get into trouble."

Reyes laughed. "Paige Willows, I think I like you." That was when Coulson came up, and they went upstairs to his office. I stood up and joined May in the cockpit. I knew what was coming, I knew how this whole thing would end, but I preferred May's company to anyone else's/ Coulson came in briefly to ask HQ for permission to fly into restricted airspace and to apologize to May for her seeing combat, all through which she stayed silent. I could tell she was mad, and figured she wouldn't talk for a while. I stared out at the passing clouds, knowing that Skye and Ward were probably talking and working out their differences, and that any minute, gas would leak into the cockpit and knock us both unconscious.

"You want to tell me why I got a call from Romanoff?" May asked, so suddenly that I started a bit. I knew Natasha would call her, I didn't think it would happen so soon.

"Natasha can be… protective," I finished lamely. "When I called her to check in earlier today, she saw the bump from Mike and sort of flipped. I accidentally let slip that you were with me on the team. I assume she asked you to look out for me?"

May nodded. "She's not going to be happy when she sees those grazes. That was a stupid stunt you pulled back there," May reprimanded. Before I could even begin to defend myself, she said, "But, I understand why you did it. It was necessary."

"I'm glad someone realizes that," I muttered, shifting in my seat.

"Coulson does, too," May confided. "He worries. You're an Avenger. You replaced him on Strike Team Delta, and he doesn't want Barton and Romanoff to loose you, too."

I was shocked, to say the least. "I wouldn't—couldn't—replace Coulson on Strike team Delta," I said. "And I haven't."

"But you've helped," May said calmly, turning to follow a certain flight path. "You've eased the pain, if only a little bit. He's kept track of them. And you." And then she shut up and left me to my own musings. Did I really help ease Clint and Natasha's pain of loosing Coulson? Suddenly, my vision blurred, and the last thing I saw was May loosing consciousness before I was out like a light.

-:-

When I woke up, my hands were tied behind my back with a ziptie, and my head was fuzzy. The tie was tight enough that I'd have to pull my thumb in unnaturally (and very painfully, I might add) far in to get one hand out. In simpler terms, I had to dislocate my thumb. May was already awake and up.

"Paige, thank goodness," Simmons said.

"We're just making a plan to escape," Skye informed me, and then May continued.

"Can't go through the doors. They're bolted, tied to the pressurization lines," she said, and I tried to clear the fuzziness out of my head. Whatever gas they used was definitely not one I would like to encounter again. It worked fast, dang it! "You two geniuses have anything?"

"It's hard to concentrate in these tense situations," Fitz defended himself.

"Deep breaths do wonders, Fitz," I said calmly, kindly. "Take some. It'll clear your mind." It always worked for me, unless I was panicking because of a dream, but I wasn't about to say anything about my dreams.

"Agreed," Ward said. "Don't freeze up. Take a breath. You don't have to come up with the whole solution. Just part of it, right?" the last question was directed at Skye, and I could hear the smile in her voice.

"Yeah," she said. "Pieces solving a puzzle."

"I love puzzles," I added in my useless random fact, because I was now focusing on the wrong subject, like I usually did. Three, almost four years of training, and I still was focusing on the things that didn't really matter in life-or-death situations. Hmm. I should probably get that checked out or something. All of them looked at me like I was crazy. "What?" I asked.

"Doesn't matter," Skye said, and proceeded to tell us her plan, which consisted of escaping, getting the 0-8-4, and blasting a hole in the side of the Bus with it.

"Well that's clearly the worst idea we've heard yet," Simmons said as soon as Skye was done explaining.

"But it could work," Skye defended.

"Reyes is going to kill us the minute we land regardless and blame it on rebels," Ward added his opinion. "This way, we have a fighting chance. I'll take it. What's first?" May turned to look at me and got my attention.

Her eyes said, _You coming with_?

_Absolutely_, mine replied. I began massaging the thumb of my right hand with my left one, bracing myself for the inevitable pain.

"We can't get upstairs without going through the lab," Fitz started.

"And the only way to release the lab doors is from upstairs," Simmons finished. I took three deep breaths, because my heart was racing and even though I didn't have my heart monitor on anymore, I had to keep it below 180 beats per minute.

"The first thing is we're tied to the cargo door," Skye said, struggling. "So unless you can—" her sentence was cut off by the loud crack of May dislocating her wrist. She had bigger hands than I did, and hers were positioned. May's loud crack was followed by the smaller one of my thumb dislocating, and I clenched my teeth against the pain.

"What the hell was that?" Fitz demanded.

Ward looked faintly disgusted. "Her wrist," he replied. "And most likely Paige's thumb." I freed myself from the ziptie and popped my thumb back into place with a sharp breath. What was worse than dislocating a joint? Popping it back into place. I stood up, helped May to her feet, and then boosted her up above the catwalk overlooking the cargo hold. I had just enough time to duck into the back on an SUV before one of Reyes's men came through. I didn't see what happened, but I heard May take the guy out. I climbed out and made my way toward the team.

May snapped her wrist back into place. "What's next?" we chorused. The others just blinked at us until I started untying them. I pulled out a knife hidden in my bra and began to hack at ward's bindings. If there is one place no one ever thinks to check for weapons on a woman, it's her bra. They took my guns and my whip, but I still had this.

Upon seeing Ward's expression, I recited, "Rule Three: don't go anywhere without a knife."

When everyone was free, they stood up and confirmed jobs. May had joined us in the hold and made her way toward the SUV. The others were confirming their positions on the matter, because in all honesty, Skye's plan was a disaster waiting to happen.

An engine revved, capturing the others' attentions. May was standing halfway inside the SUV. "You guys talk a lot," was all she said before climbing all the way in. Ward, Skye, Fitz, and Simmons hurried out of her way just as May hit the gas and slammed into the lab doors, crashing straight through. I was the first one moving towards it. I followed May through the doors, and we rushed to get to the cockpit. I heard and felt the explosion rip through the plane as the 0-8-4 blasted a hole in the side of the Bus, and I could hear Fury's ranting now. The Bus was going all over the place, making it hard to balance. When we made it to the cockpit, May knocked out the goon piloting, and while she steadied the But, I hog-tied him with my whip (which had been left on the ground, apparently).

"We can't stay in the air much longer," I said breathlessly, standing up after finishing my task.

"I know," May said loudly. "Get over here and help me!" Hah, okay, because I totally knew how to fly a jet! I'm sixteen, for crying out loud! I can't even drive a car without supervision! Still I sat down in the co-pilot seat and did what she commanded.

Suddenly, the plane stopped jerking to the right and straightened out. "They found a way to cover the hole," I said, relieved.

-:-

The Slingshot, a classified base, is where we stopped to fix the plane and get rid of the 0-8-4. I really hated 0-8-4s. Maybe even as much as Infinity Stones. Wait, scratch that. Still, it was a pretty close competition. I checked my bunk—weapons, clothes, and personal items were flung all over the place, but everything was fine other than that.

At the moment, I was standing by the open cargo hatch, while Skye talked to Coulson and May and Ward discussed Skye becoming an agent. FitzSimmons arrived, carrying a cooler filled with beer.

"Hey, come on, you guys don't want to miss this," Fitz said. As he sat down and began rambling about how fast it would take the 0-8-4 to reach the Sun. Simmons handed me a bottle of Coke, and I took it with a smile before sitting down next to may.

"—It's an irregularity," Simmons was saying. "Not… the norm."

Coulson was looking down at us. "Speaking of "not the norm," whose idea was it to blow a hole in the side of the plane?" whoops. We all stared up at him like kids who had been caught with their hand in the cookie jar.

"May… said that the doors were tied to the pressurization so I thought—" Skye started, only to be cut off by Simmons.

"So _we_ thought it was the only way to release them."

"It was everyone's idea, sir," Ward added.

"Yeah, it was quite genius, really," Fitz agreed. For a tense moment, we all stared up at the man in charge, waiting for the hammer to fall.

All Coulson said was, "Nice work."

"_All clear for lift off_!" came a voice over a loudspeaker.

"Oh, time for blast off," Fitz said, then plugged his nose for comic effect, making Simmons laugh and the rest of us smile. "Launching in three, two…" the rocket holding the 0-8-4 lifted off the ground in a column of smoke. Fitz and Simmons rambled briefly in Science, and Ward said,

"Guys, English." We all watched the rocket disappear into the cloud layer. I took a drink of my Coke, and pulled out the Peruvian chocolate from earlier, popping it into my mouth.

Behind me, I knew Sky had gotten a message from the Rising Tide, asking about her status on a hack they were running.

Behind me, I knew Skye had replied.

_I'm in_.

-:-

**Ooh, Skye! Just kidding, it's not that big of a deal. Yet. Anyway, HAPPY NEW YEAR (again), and by the way: I don't believe in New Years resolutions, so neither should you! Enjoy!**

**Love,**

**Angel**


	4. The Asset

**A/N:**

**I just decided to update whenever I can. Seriously, I'm not even kidding. Schedules were made to not be followed. Anyway, this chapter is shorter than the last one, because I basically had no idea how to really fit Paige into it. Sorry guys, not much action for Paige in this one.**

**Shout outs to **_**NN010 **_**for reviewing. I don't consider my writing to be the best, so your comment means a lot to me! Also, I want to thank **_**Rubi Yuki**_**. And by the way, that resolution is so not fair! You can't do that to an author who relies very heavily on the encouragement from her viewers! **

**Also, I should warn you all about my best friend, PhoenixDemon58. She has an account but is inactive. She will, however, send you a reply if you decide to leave a nasty review. Don't worry, Demon's harmless. As long as she hasn't had sugar, you're fine. The other night, she stole my Kindle and sent a reply to a reviewer (on another story) who left a nasty message. -_-**

**P.S. I'm typing this up while listening to TheRPGMinx and KrismPro on YouTube. It's having a very interesting effect on my concentration.**

**Disclaimer: **

**Paige is complaining because I keep hurting her! I only own her, her actions, and I am fully responsible for her injuries as well. (You guys are going to hate me by Captain America: The Winter Soldier!**

-:-

Needless to say, neither Natasha or Clint were very pleased at my less-than-perfect state. They had demanded to speak to the leader of the team, only for me to shut them down. Hey, I wasn't the only one that got hurt that last mission; Ward got hit too. It was seven at night, and I was down in the cargo hold doing my nightly push-up sets, despite Simmons's warning not to strain myself too much. I'd had worse injuries. Besides, I healed fast. Like, faster than even Natasha, who had her body altered in the KGB by force. Most of the minor grazes were practically gone by now, and the moderate ones were much smaller than they had been. I suspected it had to do with whatever brought me here, which I also suspected was an Infinity Stone.

Yes, I really, really, really hated Infinity Stones, all right? I have my reasons.

Let down, pull in breath, push up, let breath out, repeat. It was a cycle I was used to by now. Back in the beginning, I complained after four correct push-ups. But Clint had a strict regiment and it was to be stuck to, no matter what.

Soon, Ward joined me. "Shouldn't you be resting?" he asked as he pulled out a punching bag. I made a mental note of where it was stored for future workouts.

"Shouldn't you?" I countered, doing one last push-up and rolling over to do sit-ups. Ward glanced at me as he started wrapping his hands.

"You got hit more than I did," he said.

"I'm fine," I told him. He was only saying that because I was the youngest on the plane. Well, that and because he was trying to get me to trust him. Newsflash: I could pretend to trust him without actually trusting him. "I've had worse." I crossed my arms over my chest, fingers clutching my shirt to keep them anchored there, bent my knees, and began to sit up and count in my head. Ward didn't say anything, and looked at the clock. I knew Skye was late for training. She had come in, all excited about Ward being her SO, and I warned her that it wasn't going to be all fun and games. The sound of Ward hitting the bag filled the room. By the time I completed all five sets of fifteen sit-ups, it was seven thirty and Skye was just walking in.

Ward stopped punching the bag. "You know you're late."

"I'm tired," Skye complained. "From this morning's workout. I thought I was joining SHIELD, not twenty-four hour fitness." I snorted quietly and moved to the bar that was used for pull-ups.

"It's called Relative Strength Training, starting with the basics," Ward said, checking Skye's wraps. "And next time, you do fifteen push-ups for every minute you're late." Ouch. I jumped up, wrapping my hand around the bar, and began pulling myself up. My muscles were already tired and sore, but I kept going, pushing through the pain because you never know when you might just up and land in the middle of a war.

I learned that lesson the hard way.

"Fine, Mr. Fun Machine," Skye replied. "Better than pull-ups. I don't _ever_ want to do another pull-up again."

"When you find yourself hanging off the edge of a building twenty stories up, you'll be a little more reasonable," Ward replied. "Just ask Paige."

Skye turned to stare at me, and I nodded, still doing the dreaded pull-ups. "Norse god threw me off of the top of the Stark Tower during New York. Not fun. And you won't always have another Norse god to pull you back up." And then they totally ignored me. After I finished my pull-up sets, I left, heading for my bunk, where I showered and changed into comfortable clothes. My whip, as per usual, was coiled around my waist, and there was a gun in the waistband of my pants. My knife was secure in my bra.

"_Changing course, briefing in three_," came May's voice over the intercom. "_SHIELD Six-One-Six with new orders, set for Colorado airfield, north._" I rebraided the strand of my hair and headed for the commons to meet the team, throwing my hair up into a ponytail. I stood behind the couch FitzSimmons was sat on and waited.

Coulson arrived shortly after. "A few minutes ago a SHIELD transport was attacked while carrying a Priority Red protected asset off of Rout Seventy-Six near Sterling," he told us.

"Priority Red?" Simmons asked, looking excited.

"The asset was Canadian physicist Dr. Franklin Hall." Coulson showed us a picture of a balding man on the tablet in his hands. "Known for his work—"

"Oh no, not Frank," Simmons said, cutting Coulson off.

"Dr. Hall?" Fitz asked, sitting forward. "He was out Chemical Kinetics advisor our second year."

"Yeah, he was so enthusiastic about science we just adored him," Simmons continued. "We can rescue him, can't we?"

"He's one of ours, we're going to try," Coulson replied.

"And the attackers?" Ward asked.

"Invisible," Coulson said and began to move off. I looked around that the various expressions of surprise and confusion.

"Wait, _invisible_?" Skye asked. "So cool!" While yes, it was cool, it also made our job a lot harder, which she had yet to learn. At Ward's look, the smile left her face and she continued, "That's terrible."

-:-

When the Bus landed in Sterling, Colorado, we all made our way to the attack scene. Skye asked a bunch of questions on the lingo and everything, while I climbed up into the tree to investigate the SHIELD-issue SUV that had been flipped up into it. The driver was dead, and they had already moved the body. Of course, I already knew what had caused the vehicle to end up in the tree, but I had to keep up the pretense that I didn't. When I heard Simmons shouting for Fitz, I climbed down with ease, even in my heeled combat boots, and made my way over to the team as Fitz was struggling to shut down the device that had caused all of this. Once he did, Simmons picked it up. Coulson took the device from her and examined it.

"What is that?" Skye asked.

"Something big," Coulson replied grimly.

-:-

Fitz and Simmons worked on the device, Ward was sent off to question suspects, and Skye and Coulson talked about the QNB-316 "truth serum," May motioned me to follow her. She led me straight to her phone that leads directly to Fury's office.

"This is what we use to report," she said lowly. "It goes directly to Fury, no middle man. Pick it up, hit three, state your name and level." She then proceeded to do so, and inform him of the possible mole situation. "The communications are being sent over," she told me after she was done. "Grab them and tie them together." I did, sticking the huge stack of papers in a large binder. May took it and gave it to Skye for her to read.

While Coulson and Ward questioned a suspect in aiding whoever attacked SHIELD, FitzSimmons worked on the device, Skye read the communications, and I did my schoolwork. Perhaps I should be doing something to contribute to the mission, but my education kind of came first unless it was life-or-death, which it wasn't. Yet, anyway. Ward and Coulson came back with several gold bars, and FitzSimmons tracked them down to a mine owned by Quinn Worldwide. The CEO of the company was Ian Quinn. Even if I wanted to, I wouldn't be able to go undercover in place of Skye. Besides, I had to let fate run its course, and I had the perfect excuse to do it.

The team was arguing. Quinn's facilities had laser grid fences impossible to breach from the outside. SHIELD had no control in Malta, and bringing them into it would break international law. However, if we went in alone, SHIELD could basically disown us and be fine. We would take the fallout.

"Without a man inside, it's impossible," May said. "Unless you're immune to pulse-laser missions."

"If we had a monkey, we could get in," Fitz said, but was cut off briefly by an exasperated exclamation by Simmons. "If we had a small monkey, he could slip through the sensors and disable the fence's power with his adorable little hands."

"I could go in," Skye said from her position leaning against the doorframe of the briefing room, tapping away on her phone. I was the only one that seemed to hear her. Ward suggested having a few weeks to establish a cover, but Coulson shut that idea down. Hall didn't have a few weeks.

"What about me? I could go in," Skye said again, and this time Ward acknowledged her.

"Skye, this is serious."

"Wait," Coulson said. "What are you saying?"

"Well, I'm not an agent of SHIELD," Skye said, "so I can go in without breaking all these stupid rules." While she was talking, she was typing on her phone.

"International laws," Simmons chimed in.

"This isn't something the Rising Tide can hack, Skye," Ward said, but I knew what she was doing. The team descended into arguing again. At least until Skye showed us her invitation into Quinn's annual stockholder's gathering. Even then, Ward argued.

"If anyone is going in to go undercover, it'll be Paige," he said. Coulson turned to me, considering the idea.

"Don't even think about it," I told him. "I can't. Quinn knows me because I was part of the reason he ran to Malta. I may or may not have blown up one of his facilities here in the US. He knows my face and he knows who I work for. Besides, Skye got the invitation and she's right: she's not an agent of SHIELD and won't break international law. I vote Skye goes in." She gave me a grateful smile.

-:-

"Skye will walk in the front door," Coulson said. "The only external access point to Quinn's underground facility is from a beach cove. A two-man extraction team can slip in there, but it's not easy. FitzSimmons."

Fitz stepped forward. "The perimeter is surrounded by a twenty-foot high Demian laser grid. Touch it and you're toast." How delightful.

"Dead toast," Coulson clarified. Even better. "The only way to disable the grid is to pack the system and trigger a reboot. This will give the team three seconds to cross. Of course, Quinn is too smart to allow any wireless access on his property."

"That's where I come in," Skye said, a little unsure.

"Yes," Simmons said, opening a case and giving Skye a tech-savvy blush compact that would get us in. "Easy as pie."

"Or it will be," Ward said gruffly. "If you stick to the plan."

"Got it," Skye said. "Plan, green, drop, walk."

Coulson nodded. "Paige, help her get ready, and maybe give her a few tips." I nodded in affirmation, and led the way out of the room. Skye followed me, compact in hand, and I stopped and turned around in the commons, sizing her up.

"Hmm, I doubt you'll have anything good for a stockholders meeting in your closet," I said, tapping my chin. "So let's go to mine. I might just have something that would fit you." I led her to my bunk and opened my closet, digging into the way back for the bright pink dress that I've worn once. "Here, try this on." She did as I said, and it fit wonderfully. We then went to her bunk where I chose heels—two inches, suitable for a gathering like this yet easily can be worn in combat, but she won't be doing much of that. "Hmm, you look good in that dress. You can keep it. I don't like that color on me. Time for makeup and accessories." While I worked on her, she was silent, up until she asked,

"What's with the braid in your hair? You always have it."

I wondered when that was going to pop up. "It's called a remembrance braid," I told her, smoothly applying eyeliner. "Almost every female SHIELD agent wears one at least once during her training. It's to remember something. Maybe from your past, who you were before you joining SHIELD, someone you loved, someone you lost." I gave her a necklace, earrings, and a bracelet, leaving her hair as it was.

"I feel like I'm in one of those movie sleepovers," Skye said as I worked.

"Sorry," I replied. "I'm not used to getting someone else ready. I usually just know my mission and dress accordingly. There, all done." I pulled her to her feet and had her look in the full-length mirror. "Now look at your face."

"Okay," she said, unsure of where this was going.

"When I say an emotion, I want you to make the facial expression," I told her, running through an exercise I used to have to do all the time for missions like this. "Sad. Scared. In pain. Happy. Welcoming. Uh huh, just as I thought."

"What am I doing wrong?" Skye sighed, slumping some in defeat.

"Your facial expressions are fine," I assured her. "But your eyes don't change, and that's what Quinn will be looking at. When you go to make an expression, you actually have to _feel_ the emotion inside. Think of a moment when you were the happiest you ever remember."  
>She thought about it, and began to smile. Her eyes lit up, making me smile too. "See? That's what I need. Eventually, you'll just get to the point where it comes naturally and you don't have to think as long about it."<p>

The plane started going down, signaling that we were about to land in Malta. "Okay, remember to feel, and you'll be taking a taxi to Quinn's place. Oh, and here." I took the compact out of her hand and slipped it into a hand purse. "Don't loose it."

Thirty minutes later, we were on the ground and Ward, Skye, and Coulson were gone. FitzSimmons, May and I were waiting in the briefing room, with May giving Skye everything on the man she was talking to while I gave her tips on how to act through the comms. I hoped we weren't overloading her with information, but she seemed to be doing fine so far.

And then Quinn offered her a job.

"Ward, what's your status?" I asked, moving around to the other side of the table. With a few taps, I pulled up a tracking location.

"Just arriving," he replied. "Going dark."

"All right. Be careful." I swiped the tracking map over to the side and began pulling up the map to Quinn's facility.

"It's locked, but there's no lock," Skye said, referring to the door to Quinn's office.

"Uh, check for a keypad," Fitz said before popping a handful of popcorn into his mouth. I shot him a look that obviously said, _Really? Now?_

"Nothing," Skye reported back. "Wait, you can hack a keypad?"

"No," Fitz said. "But it would be fun to open." I rolled my eyes at him. Now was not the time for this.

"Is there a reception desk?" May asked.

"Okay, yeah," Skye said. "Wait, now what do I do?" And then I heard Quinn's voice and cussed. He had followed her.

"Skye, play it cool," I ordered. "Make up a story—keep it simple so you can keep track of it. Remember, lies require commitment and an element of truth." We were all tense and silent for a moment, and then she sweet-talked her way in.

"How's our girl doing?" May asked.

"Oh, for a minute I thought she was done for, but she just sweet-talked her way into Quinn's office," Simmons said, and only if she knew that "sweet-talking" involved her ratting out on SHIELD.

May looked surprised. "How did she manage that?" Fitz made a very rude insinuation before realizing he was in a room full of women.

And then Skye's comm cut out and the panic began,

"Paige, you need to go in," May said. "Make sure nothing went wrong." We both knew that wasn't an option. She reported the circumstances to Coulson and Ward.

"I won't get past the end of the drive, May, you know that," I said. "Whatever happened, it wouldn't have cut out so suddenly unless she did it herself. Whatever happened, we have to trust Skye to do her part of the bargain, May." Still, it didn't help settle the panic thrashing in my gut.

Suddenly, there was a beep. "We're in!" Simmons cried. Fitz went to work immediately, fingers flying, and then caused a reboot. Both made it in. Now all we could do was wait, I hated this feeling of helplessness, unable to do anything.

I hated being useless.

-:-

After an almost-really-bad situation, everyone was back onboard safely. May reported for combat, and Skye finally started taking her training seriously. The team was finally starting to pull together and tighten ties.

It was a shame I'd have to be leaving soon.

-:-

**So, yeah, Paige'll be leaving the team soon to head to London. But she'll go back. After Thor: The Dark World, come back to this story and continue.**

**Love,**

**Angel**


	5. Eye Spy

**A/N:**

**And I've made some revisions to Thor: The Dark World… and I'm pretty sure you guys are going to hate me for it, too. Great. Anyway, back to Agents of SHIELD. After this chapter, only two left before Thor: The Dark World.**

**Shout outs to**_**NN010**_** for encouraging me with this story (as it is longer than my other one ****) and Guest, for giving me this wonderful idea. You know the one. Thanks!**

**Disclaimer: **

**-_- You guys know the drill.**

-:-

_My heart was beating in my chest so fast it felt like a train was running through me. My hair had been torn free from my braid and now whipped in front of my face, blinding me momentarily. I could feel my body stiffening up from the crash. I heard shots, sirens, explosions, screams, so much that I felt like I was going to explode if I didn't block out the noise._

_ And then through it all, I heard Natasha's voice. It was so quiet against the other noises that it was a miracle I heard it at all. I could see him, his long hair whipping in the wind, his metal arm glinting in the sun. Frantically, I tried to locate Natasha. Her voice was coming from behind a car near me. He heard her, too, and knew where she was._

_ "Natasha!" I screamed out, running towards the car. I was so focused on getting to my teacher, my best friend, and my sister to notice that he had thrown something on the ground, which rolled under the car where Natasha's voice was coming from. I didn't realize until it was too late to turn and run the opposite direction that he had thrown a grenade._

_ The explosion ripped through the air. It was louder than everything else. I felt the excruciating heat kiss my skin, blisters popping up immediately. I flew back and hit the ground, my head cracking against the asphalt with a sickening crunch._

_ The last thing I heard was Natasha screaming my name._

I woke in my bunk with a gasp. I was breathing heavily. My hands and eyes went to my arms, and only seeing smooth, unblemished skin. There was no explosion. Natasha wasn't there. I was on the Bus, with Coulson and the rest of the team. I was safe.

My bunk opened, and my hand instantly went for the gun under my pillow. I was too high on adrenaline and fear to notice that it was just May until she said, "Stand sown, Paige. It's just me." When my eyes focused on her face, and I realized who "just me" was, I lowered the gun and put it back under the pillow.

"May," I sighed, pushing my fingers through my hair. It was only then that I realized I was sticky with sweat and that my sheets were twisted around my legs.

May looked at me. "You had a dream," she stated, as if she had known all along. "Romanoff said you have them a lot. She also said that you probably won't want to talk about it, but I should ask anyway." Of course Natasha would tell her. I'd been having the dreams ever since New York. Most of them were vivid, and most of them were about the future, as if I didn't already know what was going to happen, but none of them were… _that_ vivid. It really shook me.

Still, I couldn't about it. "I'm fine, May," I lied. "It was just a dream. Nothing important. You'd better get on the stick." She gave me a long look, probing my face to see if I would spill if she pushed the issue. Apparently, she found no evidence (or if she did, decided not to push it anyway), because she nodded and left. I looked at my clock to see it was four in the morning. I knew I wasn't going to be able to go back to sleep. Untangling my legs and standing up, I pulled on some leggings and a tank top before padding down to the cargo hold. I stretched a little to warm up first, before pulling out the punching bag. I located some wraps and wound them expertly around my hands before pulling my hair up into a messy bun.

I fixed my stance, set my sights on the bag, and began swinging.

-:-

When Simmons came downstairs, Fitz trailing her, both stopped at the bottom of the stairs and watched Paige beat the crap out of a punching bag for a moment. She looked completely focused on the object in front of her, her fists and feet connecting with it again and again. That was when Simmons noticed that the girl was barefoot. Sweat covered her body, rolling down her face and neck in droplets, and she was panting from exertion.

"Goodness, it's only eight in the morning and she's already at it," Simmons said quietly, although she wouldn't be surprised if Paige had heard her anyway. All specialists seemed to have supersonic hearing.

"You'd think she was training to be in the Olympics," Fitz muttered back.

"Well, she is a SHIELD agent, cleared for field work," Simmons said. "They're pretty much synonymous, if you thing about it. Come on, let's not stand around and gawk at her." Simmons then moved into the lab and set to work.

-:-

I was still going at the bag when Ward and Skye came in at five, and when they finished up an hour after that, and when FitzSimmons came down a couple hours after that, and when Coulson came down ten minutes after that. I only stopped when Coulson put a hand on my shoulder. I controlled the urge to swing around and attack, because I didn't want to hurt him.

"How long have you been at this?" he asked.

"I dunno. What time is it?"

"Nearly eight."

"About four hours, then," I replied, and he gave me a stern look. "Stop looking at me like that," I sighed. Then I answered his unspoken question. "Like I'm an idiot for pushing myself for so long. I took brakes and made sure to stay hydrated."

"Go get ready for the day," he told me in a resigned tone. "We'll be in Sweden soon." I nodded and opened a fresh bottle of water. I downed that one in four giant gulps before turning to put away the punching bag. Coulson, satisfied with my response to his order, moved over to the SUV, where Skye was hunkering down for some "me time." Her words, not mine. While I worked, putting away the equipment and unwrapping my hands, I vaguely listened to their conversation. Something about robbing banks, armored cars, casinos, and that someone was stealing millions in diamonds before I was finished and headed upstairs to take a shower. I soaped through my hair twice, relishing in the lukewarm water. After I was done, I dried my hair, put my remembrance braid back in, and started to braid my hair before remembering my dream. My fingers froze for a moment, before I undid the start of the braid and pulled my hair up into a ponytail. I pulled on a short sleeved blue shirt and tight black jeans, pulling on my heeled combat boots. I secured my whip around my waist and a gun in the waistband of my pants before heading to the kitchen to get something to eat.

-:-

In Sweden, I was assigned to come with May, Skye, and Coulson to check out the attack scene. It was a subway station, on a train. As we walked, Coulson talked and explained the situation to us.

"Yesterday fifty-five men, all military, were hired by one of the largest gem brokers in the world. They dressed the men in identical outfits, gave each one a randomly assigned briefcase, and sent them along twenty-five different routes here in Stockholm," Coulson told us. "No one knew which briefcase contained the diamonds, but they were still stolen." He signed a form shown to him by one of the Swedish guards lining the way to train car of the theft and murder. Skye was on her phone.

"Why the kabuki theatre?" May asked.

"They were afraid because someone's targeting diamonds," Coulson replied. "An armored car in Milan, a safe in Monte Carlo, and this."

"Not exactly low-profile heists," I said with a whistle. Whoever was doing this (I knew who was doing it, even though I couldn't quite remember her name) was pretty good to pull those off. The only other people I knew who would get away with it for sure was Natasha and May.

"Over thirty mil total," Coulson told me grimly, kneeling down at a bloodstain on the floor of the train car. The bodies were long gone by now. "Each theft occurred despite heavy security."

"These sound like inside jobs," May said, and if I didn't know any better, I would've agreed completely.

"A lot of people share that opinion," Coulson replied, and I knelt down to get a better look at the blood splatter. It was also on the pole next to it. I could see the scene play out in my head. A man was standing there, holding on. Lights go out, people panic, the man is knocked to the ground and forced to relinquish his hold. There were two initial pools of blood on the floor, leading me to believe that the hand holding the briefcase containing the diamonds had been cut off. A professional.

"You don't," Skye said, pulling me out of my inner CSI moment briefly. "CCVT cameras catch any of the action?"

"FitzSimmons is checking. The system went dark for an hour," Coulson said, standing up. I stayed squatting on the floor, eyes running over the blood pattern. It ended up on the pole because of several contributing factors: one, the way the knife might have cut through the wrist; two, the jerky motion of the train; and three, when the body hit the ground, it might have splattered up. "They think it was hacked."

"It was the same thieves every time?" May asked.

"Yes, but it was just one thief. A women," Coulson told us. "And she did it all with her eyes closed." I stood up, rolling my shoulders and feeling the burn of over-worked muscles. I should've taken something before leaving the Bus.

"Eyewitnesses ID her?" May and I asked at the same time.

"Black, athletic build, late twenties-early thirties," Coulson said. May and I shared a look. We were both thinking Romanoff up until that point, even though I knew it wasn't her.

Skye spoke up. "So you asked how she could've cracked the system," she said. "I have a pitch, but it's _way_ outside the box."

"I live outside the box," was Coulson's reply.

"Technically, you live inside a plane like the rest of us," I said. Oops, focusing on the wrong thing. Right. Murder, thefts, idea. Focus.

"There are people in the world with superpowers, right?" Skye continued, ignoring me. Any other time I'd be offended, but this time I was grateful. "What if this woman had ESP or something?"

May shut that down with facts. "There are no credible studies that support pre-cognition, telepathy, or extra sensory perception."

"Okay, so science says no," Skye said. "But this woman knew impossible things. And why'd she close her eyes? That's either random or totally important. Was she listening?" Skye tapped her index finger against her temple. "Or was she reading minds?" At our dubious looks, Skye balked. "I'm gonna go… play with my phone now." And she sat down on a bench.

"There are a few studies that support extreme heightened senses," I said, capturing everyone's attention. "Take Clint for example. His eyesight is above and beyond twenty-twenty. And maybe Skye's not that far off. While the culprit may not be reading minds, she certainly had something or someone helping her."

May turned to Coulson. "Why does HQ want us to investigate these heists?"

"They don't," Coulson said. Oh yeah, I forgot about that. "I picked this out. Any luck?" Coulson asked Skye.

"Yep," Skye replied. "I'm getting full bars, which means if I was down here, and fifty-five guys were in scary red masks, you know what I would do?" she stood up and handed phone to Coulson. "Instagram." On the screen was a picture of a man in a red mask.

-:-

Once back on the Bus, Coulson had me pull up all the posts on the web containing those men. Once I was finished, I handed him a tablet to control the photos.

"It's amazing," he said. "Every year this part of our job gets easier. Through Facebook, Instagram, and Flicker, people are surveilling themselves."

"Don't forget Snapchat," I added. "It's not popular yet, but I bet it will be. Especially among my age group." You take a picture, send it to someone with a message attached, and after they receive it, the picture "disappears." They don't disappear, though. You can still find them on the web.

Skye nodded in agreement before saying. "With many filters to choose from. I could do this pretty well when I was hacking for the Rising Tide, but you guys tag and search in ways the rest of us never dreamed."

"Obviously someone dreamed if it," I said. "Otherwise we wouldn't be doing it at the moment."

"I can run facial recognition software on the photos," May said. "Cross-reference them with our criminal databases."

"You don't have to," Coulson replied as the track and tag software locked in on a woman in the background of a certain photo. She matched the description from the eyewitnesses. "That's the thief. Her name is Akela Amador."

"You're certain?" May asked.

"I should be," Coulson replied, looking as if he had seen a ghost. Which he had, in a way. A ghost from his past. "I trained her." Skye and I exchanged looks, hers clearly asking if I knew what he was talking about. I knew he had trained someone before becoming Strike Team Delta's handler, because Clint had told me the bits and pieces Coulson had told him, but I knew whom he had trained because of my place of origin.

We followed Coulson through the plane while he explained. "Akela Amador was a SHIELD agent. Seven years ago she led a raid on one of Vanchat's GULAGs. Everyone believed that she and the other two agents were killed," he said as we went downstairs. "I had my doubts, so I sent in a second team, just in case. The found a lot of carnage, but couldn't confirm that any of it was Amador. It left the possibility open."

"That's why you chose this op," May pieced together. "When you heard about the heists."

"This is personal," I added. I knew the dangers of working personal ops. We all did. They usually didn't end well.

Coulson ignored us. "There are only a few women in the world who could pull off something so impossible," he said. "Since you and Paige are on the Bus, I thought it had to be her." And then he went into the briefing room.

Ward was waiting for us. "Swedish customs confirmed that Amador left the country using an alias on a Swedish passport. She flew into Belarus, bought a train ticket to a town called Zloda," he told us. My eyes ran over the screen, taking in any and all information posted there. Not much, as it was just her ID card from her time as a SHIELD agent. "I've also put together a list of individuals who can fence that many diamonds. There's been no contact or activity." I scanned over the faces that appeared on the map.

"Maybe she's saving them for a rainy day," Coulson said. "Buying something special. Let's focus on finding Amador."

"I'll let HQ know she's alive so they can assist with the manhunt," May said.

"I'd like to hold off on that," Coulson said, and we all gave him looks. Thirty minutes in and he's already trying to cut HQ out of the mission. Victoria Hand was going to have his (as well as ours) hands in shiny metal bracelets attached to shiny metal chairs with a pane of one-way glass. He continued, "Until we know more. Contact Belarus authorities; find us a place to park the Bus. Put together a list of inns, hotels, and pensions near Zloda. There can't be that many of them. We'll find her." Ward started to put together the list. May and I headed out of the room, but she went to contact the Belarus authorities, and I went to go call Fury.

I pulled the phone off the receiver, hit three, and said, "Willows, Paige, temporary Level Eight." The call went through, and I waited for one, two, three, four, five rings before Fury picked it up.

"About time," he said irritably.

"Going after Akela Amador," I murmured. "Holding off with telling HQ. It's personal to him."

"Fine. Keep me posted, Willows." We hung up and I looked over my shoulder to ensure no one had seen or heard me. I was in the clear. I left the vicinity, heading to the kitchen. It was a mess in there still, from everyone going in and out. Plates were left on the counters, remains of uneaten food, crumbs, everything. I tightened my ponytail and set to work, washing dishes by hand (even though there was a dishwasher), drying them, putting them away. I washed off the table and counters, putting any leftovers in the communal fridge, and basically played Bus-keeper for a good half hour.

Of course, then I had to go get ready for Belarus.

-:-

Once we touched down, Coulson, ward, Skye, and FitzSimmons set out in the van. I stayed on the plane with May, as I was ordered by Coulson to work on my schoolwork. Honestly, I think he was just trying to keep me out of the field and from getting hurt again. Okay, I guess I could understand that. My track record wasn't looking so hot, with me getting knocked out on our first mission, then getting several bullet grazes on our second. This was our fourth mission on the team. Two out of four, I'd gotten myself injured. May was in the briefing room, playing the middleman between HQ and Coulson. While I did my Biology homework, I muttered my vocabulary words for Italian, German, and then Russian. I found that the best way for me to learn languages was for me to use repetition and to not focus on it directly. It's kind of like watching TV and listening to music at the same time. If you only have one earbud in, you can still hear the TV. Since human brains can't focus on both equally, one of them takes the fore, and the other is on a back channel.

I had just finished Biology and was starting on History (I hated American history as much as I hated English history) when May came out of the briefing room with a grave look on her face. "Skye and FitzSimmons were attacked. They're coming back now." I dropped my history and followed her to the catwalk over the cargo bay. Fifteen minutes later, the rest of the team came in. May was furious. I wasn't much better myself.

After we had determined that there were no injuries, and everyone got back to work, Skye got us back onto the feed that she had found earlier. Together, we watched in perplexion as Amador was looking at herself in a mirror.

"Where's the camera?" Coulson asked. After a minute of watching Amador messing around with her eye, we all came to the same conclusion, but only May voiced it.

"It's her eye," she said. "_She's _the camera." Amador closed her eyes, and we could see the metal implant inside her skull.

"It switches to backscatter when she closes her eyes," Fitz observed.

Skye looked at Ward. "You're a robot," she said. "Can you do that?"

Ward ignored her and asked, "Who has tech like this." The answer was painstakingly obvious, but Fitz said it anyway.

"We don't. Not like this. Not this small and internal. It's at least a decade ahead of anything I've seen."

"Well, the "tech of the future" has been created today," I said. "And obviously not by SHIELD. So that means that someone out there has tech that can be used to wreak havoc. Do you have any idea how may problems something like this could cause us?"

Fitz glared at me and continued. "Though, no that I've seen it, I could maybe approximate the backscatter x-ray, a micro-transceiver that somehow doesn't fry her brain. An internal power source…"

"All miniaturized," Simmons continued. Then they both chorused, "That's genius!"

"We have to bring her in," Coulson said.

"We have to take her out," May argued. "She's a weapon. I'll call HQ, see if we can bring in a task force to help us."

"Our team can handle this." Coulson was adamant. This was the problem with personal missions. People get sentimental, and then they get stubborn, and then they think they can take on the world and end up hurting people in the process.

May moved over to him. "I get it," she said. "I feel responsible. Maybe you pushed her too hard. But she tried to kill three members of our team."

"If she wanted us dead, we'd be dead," Coulson argued.

"We got lucky," May countered. "You want to risk our lives again?"

"You told me you were ready for combat, that you had my back," Coulson accused.

"Don't ever doubt it," May said evenly. "But you are defending this girl at the expense of the team."

"Because we protect our own," Coulson said,

"With all due respect, sir," Ward cut in. "She's not one of our own." While they were busy talking, Amador had been busy as well. And I wasn't the only one that noticed.

"Guys," Skye said, capturing their attention. Amador was writing a message on a piece of hotel stationary—_Can I sleep_?

"Why does she have to ask for permission?" Simmons asked. Her question was answered as a reply to Amador's note popped up at the bottom of the feed—_Stand by_.

"She's not being watched," Coulson realized. "She's being controlled. We have to find her. We'll take shifts watching the feed. Sooner or later, she'll look at something that will clue us in on her location."

I saw the look on May's face before she said, "I'll take the first watch." After everybody had left, she turned to face me. "Don't say anything," she ordered me.

"My lips are sealed," I replied. "But Coulson will be furious, and I'm not taking the fallout for this."

"That's fine," May replied. "As far as he'll ever know, you didn't know a thing." I turned around and left.

It was of no surprise to me when May went missing later that night, only to return with an unconscious Amador and a livid Coulson.

-:-

I resisted the urge to fiddle with the glasses on my face. I had tried to resist doing the mission, but once Coulson had given the order, and I had no reason not to do it, I had no choice. We were headed to the Todorov building, and I was driving because I didn't have a choice. Skye was in the backseat, handling the technical side of things. At the moment, the glasses (rectangle-shaped and black plastic frames that were _so_ not my style) were hooked up to a laptop while Skye ensured that I would still receive the images and messages once they were disconnected.

Inside, I was freaking out. Ward was supposed to do this mission, not me. I could be completely messing up the Timeline. People could die because of this! No, I wouldn't let it come to that. I would just have to make sure that things go like they did in the show. I need to make excuses and a game plan.

It was too late. We stopped at our destination. "Where are we?" Skye asked.

"Todorov building," Ward replied, hunching down slightly to get a better look at the place. "I think it's research, not military."

"Looks like a prison," I said. "We wireless yet?"

"Yep. Ready to detach," Skye said, and I felt her hand behind my ear, pulling off the wire connected to the glasses. "Don't look at me," she warned. "They need to think you're her." Apparently her free hand had landed next to Ward's head and hit his ticklish spot. After she noticed his movement (I was watching from the corner of my eye), she said, "And oh my God, Super Spy is ticklish!"

"Testing backscatter," I said before Ward could say anything. I reached up and hit a button. Next thing I know, I'm seeing in x-ray.

"Good to go," Skye said. She handed me a wireless transmitter/receiver. I stuck it in my pocket.

Ward looked at me, and I looked back from the corner of my eye. "Remember, we can't help you in person," he said, and I nodded slightly. I opened the door, got out, and headed for the building. I kept a steady pace—not too fast, as to be obvious I'm in a rush, but not so slow as to tip off whoever was watching me that I wasn't focused. Once inside, I looked around.

"_Fitz and Simmons are prepped for surgery_," came Skye's voice through the comm in my ear. "_It should be any minute now_." I followed the line, the prox card in my hand. "_Hey, remember, you don't have the same skin color, so don't look at your hands when you swipe the card_." I know she was just trying to be helpful, but she was kind of distracting.

"I know," I murmured through slightly parted lips. Without looking down, I scanned the card, and moved past the guard and further into the facility. I followed the crowd, my modest pumps clicking on the floor. I had changed into a business suit—a navy blue pencil skirt and blazer with a white shirt underneath and heels. Not the best outfit for fighting, but whatever worked. "Approaching Delta Three." I took out the card, and once again swiped it without looking.

"_Careful! Mirror_," Skye warned me. I was thankful that she had, because I had completely forgotten about it. I turned my head away like I was cracking my neck. I knew Coulson was tracking the handler, and that FitzSimmons were starting to perform surgery on Akela to take the kill switch out of her. I turned the corner. Once outside of a room marked with the number five, I got a message—_Target confirmed. Stand by._

"_What do they mean_ target?" Skye asked.

"_It's never good_," Ward replied. "_Especially for the target._" I ducked out of sight of the security guard on the inside.

"Let's hope it's a knockout and not a kill," I muttered. I frantically racked my brain for a reason to get out of this. They're going to want me to seduce the guy. It was supposed to be Ward on this mission, not me, and he was supposed to have problems getting in.

"_You should get out of there_," Skye said.

"I've come this far," I replied. "I'll finish it. Whatever it takes." I peered into the glass at the guard and got the message—_Seduce him_. I took several deep breaths.

"_What are you waiting for_?" Ward asked.

"Shut up," I hissed back. "Next time, you get to seduce the stony security guard. He doesn't look like he'll fall for it."

"_Let me see_," Skye said. "_Nope. Odds are he'll call backup. You're gonna have to get emotional. Please don't die._" I took a deep breath, scanned the card, and went inside. The guard stood up immediately. He asked me to show him my identification. I made a show of looking all over for it, and then began to get flustered. Soon, tears began running down my face, and I thanked the heavens for waterproof makeup. I blubbered on about how this was so important to my career and that if I didn't get in there, my family would starve.

When it became clear that wasn't working, I sighed. "I guess not." He moved forward to grab me, but in three precise movements, he was out cold on the floor. I wiped the tears off my face, scanned my card and it let me in. I found myself in a room (wow, what a surprise). There were chalkboards on the walls, and two guys on typewriters who stopped and looked at me before going back to work.

"_What now_?" Skye asked. "_Are you supposed to grab one of these guys_?" I walked forward, scanning the walls until I caught sight of certain writing. Circles and lines connected strangely, with equally strange writing. _The alien writing_. The image of my glasses froze for a second, as if they had taken a picture, and I got another message—_Mission complete. Good luck._ Good luck. That didn't bode well for me. I left the room, back where the security guard was still out cold. A countdown timer on his computer caught my eye.

I growled. "I figured out what I need the security guard for," I said. "His password."

"_Maybe I can talk you through a hack_," Skye said. _"Give em a minute._" The last second turned into a zero.

"We're ut of minutes," I said, and then alarms began blaring. I knelt down and stole the guard's gun. "Ward, meet me in the south side of the building ASAP!" I left the room, hiding the gun.

"_Gotcha_," Ward said. I kept my head low, trying to look inconspicuous, but it failed as soon as the first guard came in. I started running, pulling out my gun. The guard followed me. Whoever said running in heels was hard was an idiot. Of curse, I was only wearing one inches. It was a whole lot harder with four inches. I heard a phone ring as I ducked into a hall. Turning on the backscatter, I could see the guards and took shots at them as I ran. Fitz called, distracting me, and I looked right into a mirror.

"Fitz, cut the wires now!" I yelled. I kept moving, ducking guards until I decided to take a short cut. I jumped through a window, landing on a cargo trailer. Taking off my heels, I ran along the glass-covered metal (sustaining several minor cuts) until I could drop down, right in front of the SUV. Ward barely managed to hit the brakes in time. I climbed in the passenger seat. "Let's go." Ward peeled out of there.

Once back on the Bus, Simmons took care of my minor cuts from the glass.

I only hoped I hadn't just entirely screwed up the Timeline.

-:-

**So this was quite a long chapter. And don't worry, Paige did not screw up the Timeline. It's just fun to make her worry ;) And now she's yelling at me. Whoops. Until next time, my lovelies!**

**Love, Angel**


End file.
